Adults are the Dirtiest Beasts
As is the case in many works, this book has a hefty population of adults and kids despite animals being its focused. While not all the kids are exactly precious jewels, the adults are for the most part pretty terrible people. “The Pig” undergoes an enlightenment revealing the profit-motive at work in both the farmer and butcher. “The Crocodile” is a poem about a vile reptile that turns out to be a poem-within-the-story being told as a bedtime story to his kid who then stimulates the fear engendered by the poem by pretending Crocky-Wock is making its way toward the bedroom. A rather sadistic dentist also makes an appearance, but the volume concludes appropriately with “The Tummy Beast” which co-stars a particularly unpleasant mother who calls her son fat and horrid.
British Superiority
Dahl’s mother country comes off pretty well in this book, though not with any special sort of greatness. Its superiority is rather expressed through context in which England is special because it is not somewhere else. A little boy riding the back of a toad makes it from Scotland to Dover without incident, but as soon as he hops across the Channel into France they are set upon by natives brandishing carving knifes in lust pursuit of frogs’ legs to eat. “The Ant-Eater” features one of the few unlikable kids in the book, a particularly loathsome kid named Roy who calls San Francisco home. This setting allows the author to toss some satirical zingers at American pronunciation of the mother tongue. “The Cow” is about a bovine named Miss Milky Daisy who sprouts wings which brings out millions every day to greet the sight with cheers and applause with one very notable exception being a man who treks all the way from Afghanistan just to heckle her.
Animals are Not People, Too
Although often anthropomorphized and occasionally interacting well with children, one of the themes at work as a whole is reminding readers—especially children—that animals are, truly, beasts. The climax of “The Lion” is his announcement that his next meal is going to be the narrator himself. “The Scorpion” openly and directly offers a waring against treating the creature as a friend with reminders of his capacity to sting. Even “The Pig” which is treated perhaps as the most people-like animal in the book is portrayed as harboring the capacity to become a predatory of humanity that is safeguarded only on account of physical size. Given the intelligence and opportunity, the poem suggests, pig farmers and butchers would facing revenge on a daily basis. The lesson is simple but clear: no matter how cute animals may be in real life or, especially, in cartoon versions, they act from an instinct that always carries the potential for harm.
